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Failed magic rolls


Gamesmeister

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If I fail to make a spirit magic roll, there are no direct consequences i.e. I dont spend any magic points or rune points as a result of the failure. Therefore, given that I can keep trying, does that mean I can auto-cast any spirit magic spell or rune magic spell outside of melee rounds? Or does the "Reattempting ability rolls" rule kick in, and if I fail the roll I can only try again at a penalty, or after a certain period of time has elapsed?

So far I've played it as auto-casting, but it always felt slight odd to me hence the question

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11 minutes ago, Gamesmeister said:

does that mean I can auto-cast any spirit magic spell or rune magic spell outside of melee rounds?

I always have my players make the rolls, just in case they fumble.  But you could certainly rule that they auto-cast it (particularly spirit magic).

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14 hours ago, dumuzid said:

My group does a bit of a mix of those approaches.  We mostly handwave spirit magic casting rolls outside of combat, since you can just re-attempt with no ill effect, but we always roll rune magic since a fumble can have such drastic effects

Same for me. For sorcery, we also always roll (whatever RQ version), because Criticals and Fumbles have effects.

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15 hours ago, jajagappa said:

I always have my players make the rolls, just in case they fumble.  But you could certainly rule that they auto-cast it (particularly spirit magic).

Correct me if I'm wrong, but only straight success/failure matters for Rune spells and Spirit Magic spells, right?

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55 minutes ago, GAZZA said:

Correct me if I'm wrong, but only straight success/failure matters for Rune spells and Spirit Magic spells, right?

A Critical success with Rune Magic casts the spell for free - you don't spend the Rune points but do get the effect.

A Fumble spends the Rune points but you don't get the effect - the power drains from you.

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56 minutes ago, GAZZA said:

Spirit Magic

Yes - page 256

Quote

There are no additional effects for critical successes or fumbles when using spirit magic.

However as has been said in other threads:

With sorcery,, a critical reduces the cost to 1 mp and a fumble looses all committed mps with no effect.

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17 hours ago, Gamesmeister said:

If I fail to make a spirit magic roll, there are no direct consequences i.e. I dont spend any magic points or rune points as a result of the failure. Therefore, given that I can keep trying, does that mean I can auto-cast any spirit magic spell or rune magic spell outside of melee rounds? Or does the "Reattempting ability rolls" rule kick in, and if I fail the roll I can only try again at a penalty, or after a certain period of time has elapsed?

 

We take it again from the next time you can cast spirit magic, which may, depending on your statement of intent, be at the start of the next Melee Round.

One interesting thing from that is that you get to curse your weak spirit (or in the case of an unfortunate Humakti and a set of very bad rolls recently, your failure to connect to your god).  In general, people tend to give up on a thing after a few failures and do something else instead, despite there being no mechanical reason to.  Obviously there is some reason it is not working; take your spirit's hint and do something else.

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Outside of combat, I don't always make players roll spell chance. Maybe if they have a low POW or rune I might, as there is a non-trivial chance of a fumble. As a player I'd want to always roll my Rune spell cast, as there is a chance of a critical and not spending the RP.

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15 hours ago, PhilHibbs said:

Outside of combat, I don't always make players roll spell chance. Maybe if they have a low POW or rune I might, as there is a non-trivial chance of a fumble. As a player I'd want to always roll my Rune spell cast, as there is a chance of a critical and not spending the RP.

Or just to get the tick on your Rune, to be honest. :)

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8 hours ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

In a non-critical situation I will sometimes try my weaker Rune (once) to cast a rune spell to try to get a check.

But a non-critical situation should not necessarily allow you to get an experience check.

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55 minutes ago, jajagappa said:

But a non-critical situation should not necessarily allow you to get an experience check.

Given the scarcity of Rune Points, I think the cost warrant the experience check, even if the spell is cast in a non critical situation. After all, when casting, you impersonate your god, and the risks are there (in case of fumble).

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To clarify, "non-critical" means "non-time-critical", I'm willing to retry next round.

Say, in one minute I'm trying to impress Kallyr with my Song, which is important, so I cast Charisma ahead of time.  Might try Illusion **once** to get a cheapie check, if that fails, then go with a much higher Fertility.

Yes, it's a bit of grubbing for checks.  I confess.

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2 hours ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

... Yes, it's a bit of grubbing for checks.  I confess.

I always tease my players that they now have a character-class:

 

 

Tick Hunter

(It's a prestige class off Ranger)

 

also, I often disallow simple tick-hunting; if there isn't real risk, real need (more than just the minor chance of a fumble -- the downside of a simple failure needs to be something the character ardently wishes to avoid!!!), then it gets no "check:"  it's simply an element of practice and training, and contributes to Seasonal advancement.

C'es ne pas un .sig

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On 5/3/2020 at 3:23 AM, g33k said:

 

also, I often disallow simple tick-hunting; if there isn't real risk, real need (more than just the minor chance of a fumble -- the downside of a simple failure needs to be something the character ardently wishes to avoid!!!), then it gets no "check:"  it's simply an element of practice and training, and contributes to Seasonal advancement.

Agreed! What's the point of doing the casting when you can just claim the Rune as a cult skill to be improved, as per normal rules (which don't specifically mention Runes as cult skills, but I think they should be obvious!)

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3 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

Agreed! What's the point of doing the casting when you can just claim the Rune as a cult skill to be improved, as per normal rules (which don't specifically mention Runes as cult skills, but I think they should be obvious!)

Depends on how many seasons you get where they don't adventure, but in my current campaign I suspect that number is going to be pretty close to zero, at least for a while.

In a sense using a Rune spell is always somewhat risky, because if you fumble you lose the rune points. But then again I consider the core advancement mechanics in RQG to be glacially slow so I'm not really the type to be bothered by something as minor as an extra chance at a Rune improvement roll when I'm already giving advancement rolls at the start of every session and allowing separate checks for Specials, Criticals, and Fumbles (so you could get as many as 4 chances to advance a skill per session). So given that I'm already somewhat off the beaten path here I can understand if other GMs disagree. :)

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3 hours ago, GAZZA said:

In a sense using a Rune spell is always somewhat risky, because if you fumble you lose the rune points.

I read that as "you expend the rune points without reaping any of the benefits", not "you (permanently) lower your rune point pool by the number of rune points invested in the fumbled spell".

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Telling how it is excessive verbis

 

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On 5/2/2020 at 6:55 PM, Rodney Dangerduck said:

To clarify, "non-critical" means "non-time-critical", I'm willing to retry next round.

Say, in one minute I'm trying to impress Kallyr with my Song, which is important, so I cast Charisma ahead of time.  Might try Illusion **once** to get a cheapie check, if that fails, then go with a much higher Fertility.

Yes, it's a bit of grubbing for checks.  I confess.

As GM I would say try all the time you want but with the same path (so here if you try illusion, you continue with illusion)

And then if Kallyr is bored after 2-3-4-5 rolls, you will probably know the power of the opposite rune of fertility

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21 hours ago, Joerg said:

I read that as "you expend the rune points without reaping any of the benefits", not "you (permanently) lower your rune point pool by the number of rune points invested in the fumbled spell".

Oops, sorry, never meant to imply that! I read it the same way, but that's still a consequence that I'd be happy to hand out a tick for risking. Losing Rune Points temporarily, even in RQG, is not (IMHO) an insignificant consequence.

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On 5/4/2020 at 1:35 AM, GAZZA said:

But then again I consider the core advancement mechanics in RQG to be glacially slow so I'm not really the type to be bothered by something as minor as an extra chance at a Rune improvement roll when I'm already giving advancement rolls at the start of every session and allowing separate checks for Specials, Criticals, and Fumbles (so you could get as many as 4 chances to advance a skill per session). So given that I'm already somewhat off the beaten path here I can understand if other GMs disagree.

Back when I started playing (in RQ2), our GM allowed +5% for the first skill check, but for every full 5 additional successes you could increase 1%. Same roll to gain something. Really helped us in the Puzzle Canal where we all had base or just over base Boating skill. I gained about 12% in the first incursion (off ~35 successes, he made us roll Boat a lot. Thank goodness he didn't have the entire boat capsize when someone fumbled). He also told us when we could roll skill increases, which was usually after a significant portion of one adventure, but more often than once a season. He also allowed non-check box skills to be 'checked' once a season. So they went up slower, but not as slow as needing training for each one.

Today, in my game, I also grant additional checks for Special and Criticals. I hadn't considered Fumbles. Three is enough. I also allow one for non-check box skills to gain a check every season. I am toying with making Training a set 5%. It already takes a season. Two seasons would increase a Stat an average of 1, which may take you over a bonus category, boosting every skill in that category by 5% (and making future gains that much easier). Stat training is much more effective than 1 season=2% (choice) or 2.5% (rolled) in one skill.

So others tread on your not-so-beaten path.

 

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I am sure I'm not original, as I grabbed the advancement house rules from somewhere here I think. :)

I did it for two main reasons. Firstly, I've tried to run Glorantha games before (with RQ3) and never really gotten much interest - a few sessions, maybe, before petering out. Part of this was that I didn't really know Glorantha well enough to convey my love for it accurately to the players (which RQG does make a fair bit easier - that family history stuff is great for building that sense of being a living world, and the fact that Runes actually are a thing is great too - I say this because I bag on the new rules a fair bit, and will doubtless continue to do so, but I am happy that there is a version of RuneQuest in print in 2020!), but a large part of it was that some of my players felt that their characters didn't change much from session to session - four or five sessions in they were still essentially playing what they'd started with, only a few extra percentage points in a couple of skills to the difference.

Secondly, I decided to start my game in 1615 instead of 1625 mostly because IMG none of the "canonical" events by big name Elminsters (a term I use for pet NPCs, here referring to such individuals as Kallyr but mainly Argrath) will necessarily occur, or at least will not necessarily occur as written. Ideally I'd like the PCs to be at least involved with the liberation of Sartar, if not actually doing it themselves. If it works out, I'd like to run the Cradle scenario and have the PCs at least included when it goes into Magasta's Pool for the Hero Quest, possibly without even having Argrath (sorry, "Garrath Sharpsword") there at all. To do that, the PCs need to get to at least Rune level and arguably Coder level in 10 years of game time, and while I don't regard 50 seasons worth of improvement rolls to be necessarily too short for that, I also don't have a problem if they get there in 5 years, or 2 years, because it's not as if the NPCs in the game are going to complain that I'm being too generous to their opposition. :)

I do need to figure out a way to get them to accept the value of training though; they have a certain resistance to down time. We're wrapping up River of Cradles probably on Saturday; I'm aiming to continue with the Borderlands scenarios and have them skip a bit of time as retainers of the Duke.

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